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“Black and Jewish: A Conversation”

Black and Jewish: A Talk Series: Panel 1

Panelists:
Rebecca Pierce
Anthony Russell
Sara Feldman (Moderator)

The Center for Jewish Studies and the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research are pleased to announce a talk series on the intersection of Black and Jewish identities in American culture, politics, and religious life. The lives and experiences of those who identify as Black and Jewish have received little scholarly attention despite their growing prominence in current conversations around race and religion in the US and outsized contributions to Jewish and American culture. Largely in response to the Black Lives Matter movement, Jewish communities have recently begun to reckon with the challenges of diversity and the ways that white privilege has often structured, knowingly or unknowingly, Jewish institutions throughout the US. Black and Jewish individuals have been at the forefront of these sometimes difficult confrontations, revising past narratives of “Black-Jewish relations” and the history of Jewish involvement in the civil rights movement while demanding critical attention to the inequity and prejudice that have gone unchecked in Jewish American communal life. Such figures have also been essential contributors to broader movements for social justice, often bringing deep Jewish learning to their activism surrounding organized labor, the refugee crisis, and much more. They have been influential across the spectrum of American culture, Jewishness figuring as a sometimes overlooked component in their creative and artistic endeavors.

This talk series aims to amplify Black and Jewish voices and to foster new conversations around the challenges and prospects of Black diversity and Jewish diversity. Speakers include political and cultural activists, religious leaders, memoirists, artists, and filmmakers. All events will be free and open to the public and broadcast virtually over Zoom.

Feb 22, 2021 05:00 PM in Eastern Time (US and Canada)